A beautiful tribute!  
" ...Rise up slowly, Angel.  It's hard to let you go..."
Sincere condolences.   MLB

What a wonderful tribute.

I am so sorry that he was taken from you so unexpectedly &  share your
grief for a beloved pet who meant your reason for life. At this stage
in grief, words don't mean very much. but I assure you that he will be
there waiting to meet you @ the other side of the Rainbow Bridge when
your time comes to join him....

Accept our sincere condolences....
Sheelagh

What a beautiful, loving tribute to Tommy.  When you feel able, I hope you
will adopt another cat.  There is never a way to replace those we loved, but
you can love another -- and that will also be a special tribute to your love
for Tommy and your knowledge that our cats are part of our family.

MaryL

Hello all, and thank you for the kind words you have taken the time to post.

The days are hard right now, and all I want to do is go to sleep and never
wake up. I am finding it so hard to live without my little Tommy.

Whenever I used to feel down, or depressed about anything, I would always
put it all into perspective by just thinking about Tommy waiting for me at
home, how the fact that I have him overcomes any hardship. Now, I habitually
and sub-consciously try to knock myself out of my depressed state by
thinking of him. But then I am overwhelmed by sorrow and pain when I realise
I have no 'escape' any more, nothing to turn to, because he is gone. The one
who could release me of my hurt, is the one who has caused it. I don't know
where to turn to, or what to do.

Strange that so small mortality should leave
So large an emptiness: for as we grieve
Your little life of few but happy years
Ended for us, one who could understand
Each subtle word, and answer hand with hand
Had hardly taken greater toll of tears.

Yet why should we not mourn for as a friend?
That name was yours: if every man would spend
His life as well, earth were not hard to save.
Grant that God made your heart and brain but small.
What more has an archangel than his all?
Amd all God gave to you, to us you gave.

--Amelia Josephine Burr

===========================

Our rooms are very still today,
The loneliness...a void;
That dented pillow mutely mourns
Companionship...destroyed!
That fluffy ball of purring fur--
My comfort--subtle teacher--
Has left a tender tolerance
For ever living creature.
My traints and faults were audited
By questioning, loving eyes;
All tests of friendship were fulfilled
By trust that verified.

--Nellie Baldwin Rudser

===========================

With you a part of me hath passed away;
For in the peopled forest of my mind
A tree made leafless by this wintry wind
Shall never don again its green array.
Chapel and fireside, country road and bay,
Have something of their friendliness resigned;
Another, if I would, I could not find,
And I am grown much older in a day.
But yet I treasure in my memory
Your gift of charity, and young heart's ease,
And the dear honour of your amity;
For these once mine, my life is rich with these.
And I scarce know which part may greater be,--
What I keep of you, or you rob from me.

--George Santayana

===========================

I say hello, but sadly good-bye,
as I hold you in my arms.
You, who I have known,
deep within my heart.
You are so real to me.
For moments, yet for all eternity.

Why?

Why,
I ask,
must this be?

To endure in pain
is to ask for answers.
Why must this be?

Does God know why?
Will He enlighten me?
Will He strengthen my faith,
my beliefs so I can endure?
Will I ever know the answer?

Why?

--Julie Fritsch

===========================

I shall walk in the sun alone
Whose golden light you loved:
I shall sleep alone
And, stirring, touch an empty place:
I shall write uninterrupted
(Would that your gentle paw
Could stay my moving pen just once again!).

I shall see beauty
But none to match your living grace:
I shall hear music
But not so sweet as the droning song
With which you loved me.

I shall fill my days
But I shall not, cannot forget:
Sleep soft, dear friend,
For while I live you shall not die.

--Michael Joseph

===========================

Comrades of our past were they,
Of that unreturning day.
Changed and aging, they and we
Dwelt, it seemed, in sympathy.
Alway from their presence broke
Somewhat which remembrance woke
Of the loved, the lost, the young--
Yet they died, and died unsung....

Fare thee well, companion dear!
Fare for ever well, nor fear,
Tiny though thou art, to stray
Down the uncompanion'd way!
We without thee, little friend,
Many years have not to spend;
What are left, will hardly be
Better than we spent with thee.

--Matthew Arnold

===========================

Since you have gone the sun has left the sky,
No breezes blow,
No birds sing
To ease the aching vacuum in my heart.
I shall not forget your gentle ways;
No judgements made,
No difficult demands,
No needs save one,
To share your life with mine.
Now kind, uncomprehending people say
"Cheer up, you'll love another pet some day."

--Hilda Lunn

===========================

Pet was never mourned as you,
Purrer of the spotless hue,
Plumy tail and wistful gaze,
While you humoured our queer ways,
Or outshrilled your morning call
Up the stairs and through the hall--
Foot suspended in its fall--
While, expectant, you would stand
Arched, to meet the stroking hand;
Till your way you chose to wend
Yonder, to your tragic end.

Never another pet for me!
Let your place all vacant be;
Better blankness day by day
Than companion torn away.
Better bid his memory fade,
Better blot each mark he made,
Selfishly escape distress
By contrived forgetfulness,
Than preserve his prints to make
Every morn and eve an ache.

From the chair whereon he sat
Sweep his fur, not wince thereat;
Rake his little pathways out
Mid the bushes roundabout;
Smooth away his talons' mark
From the claw-worn pine-tree bark,
Where he climbed as dusk embrowned
Waiting us who loitered round.

Strange it is this speechless thing,
Subject to our mastering,
Subject for his life and food
To our gift, and time, and mood;
Timid pensionor of us Powers,
His existence ruled by ours,
Should--by crossing at a breath
Into safe and shielded death,
By the merely taking hence
Of his insignificance--
Loom as largened to the sense,
Shape as part, above man's will,
O the Imperturbable.

As a prisoner, flight debarred,
Exercising in a yard,
Still retain I, troubled, shaken,
Mean estate, by him forsaken;
And this home, which scarcely took
Impress from his little look,
By his faring to the Dim,
Grows all eloquent of him.

Housemate, I can think you still
Bounding to the window-sill,
Over which I vaguely see
Your small mound beneath the tree,
Showing in the autumn shade
That you moulder where you played.

--Thomas Hardy

===========================

When humans die, they make a will
To leave their homes, and all they
Have to those they love.
I too would make a will, if I could write.

To some poor, wistful, lonely stray
I'd leave my happy home,
My dish, my cozy bed, my cushioned chair, my toy,
The well-loved lap,
The gently stroking hand,
The loving voice,
The place I made in someone's heart,
The love, that at the last,
Could help me to a peaceful, painless end
Held in loving arms.

If I should die,
Oh! Do not say:
"No more a pet I'll have
To grieve me by its loss."
Seek out some lonely, unloved cat
And give my place to him.
This is my legacy,
The love I leave behind,
'Tis all I have to give.

--Margaret Trowton

===========================

Is Heaven all you asked of it, O little cat? Did Peter fit
A halo for your graceless head?
Is there a quilt for your special bed,
And a bowl of cream just out of reach
Of your thieving paw? Or do They teach
You not to steal in paradise?
Does the flapping of Their wings entice?
Do you scamper and swing on a golden fence,
Or are They teaching you reverence?
And are there really golden thrones
Up there? Or do the Mighty Ones
Have nice fat chairs that you can claw
And tear and snag with an impious paw?
And do the angels understand
That a little cat in a lonely land
Still longs for a kiss and a friendly cuff?

Celestial joys are not enough.
Please, some small saint in shining white,
Hold him close in your arms tonight.

--Bianca Bradbury

===========================

Dancing ribbons pushed by time
Float through an old kitten's dreams.
She chases them into eternity,
And catches them,
As they change into angels' wings.

--Daryl Douglas Foyer

===========================

Grieve not,
nor speak of me with tears,
but laugh and talk of me
as if I were beside you...
I loved you so--
'twas Heaven here with you.

--Isla Paschal Richardson

===========================

Farewell, my humans, yet not farewell,
Where I go you too shall dwell.
I am gone before your face,
A moment's time, a little space.
When you come where I have stepped,
You will wonder why you wept.

--Edwin Arnold

===========================

Aionía aftoú e mnéme--May his memory be eternal.

--from the Eastern Orthodox funeral liturgy

===========================

Warm summer sun
Shine kindly here,
Warm southern wind
Blow softly here,
Green sod above
Lie light, lie light—
Good night, dear heart,
Good night, good night.

--adapted from Robert Richardson's poem "Annette" by Samuel Langhorne
Clemens (Mark Twain) as the epitaph for his daughter, Olivia Susan Clemens

Take care,
Nicholas

I'm so sorry for your loss. When my first cat that was ever just
mine and went through everything with me from moving several times,
to divorce, and other losses, losing him was devastating.

Here's a poem that I found comforting even though it made me cry
hysterically every time I read it.  I printed it and framed it over
a collage of photos of him. He has a memorial on the wall that
he'll always have no matter how many kitties come after him.

Take care and time heals.

__________________________________________

Four Feet in Heaven

Your favorite chair is vacant now...
No eager purrs to greet me.
No softly padded paws to run
Ecstatically to meet me.

No coaxing rubs, no plaintive cry
Will say it's time for feeding.
I've put away your bowl, and all
The things you won't be needing;

But I will miss you little friend,
For I could never measure
The happiness you brought me,
The comfort and the pleasure.

And since God put you here to share
In earthly joy and sorrow;
I'm sure there'll be a place for you
In Heaven's bright tomorrow...

- Alice E. Chase